Russ would have been alarmed if he'd known the prospect of breaking down were even being considered. Sam collected people who weren't all fucking right - he had a brief memory of the louche, dazed man in Victoriana who'd slumped like someone had slit all the stuffing out of him and Lin who was just Lin. Now Louis, who wasn't at all like the old Boss back at the shop in Vegas, who swore throatily and often, smoked constantly and who would have been leaning out the window throwing v signs at whoever was passing. He wasn't thinking about driving to the police. The police were, in Russ's mind, associated with suspicion and long-suffering annoyance, cells and antiseptic and other drunks locked up for the night.
Still. He didn't want to show up at Sam's with her brother looking freshly beaten and naked. Russ wasn't sure Sam would take it so well. Russ's eyes slid sideways from the road to the markings, very fresh in his mind. It made him uneasy, all those symbols. It wasn't violence, not the clean, rough kind that smelled like beer and sweat and the grubby bar floor. It had intention and Russ wasn't keen on anyone who intended to pick on the little brother of the head of a mafia gang.
He drove without comment, the roar of the engine would have drowned any attempt at conversation and besides, he didn't know what the fuck to say? Sorry I've seen the best part of your birthday suit without buying you a drink first? Maybe that would have gone down better if Louis had been a Louisa; Russ thought of Ford and shifted his weight in his seat, cracked his knuckles around the steering wheel. He knew the way to the Donovan mansion, everyone fucking did.
"I can wait in the truck," he said, as they pulled up along the clean sweep of drive, and he turned his head to look at Louis once more. It wasn't apparently, an option for Russ to leave without him.